TEHRAN - Iranian Finance and Economic Affairs Minister Seyyed Shamseddin Hosseini said here on Thursday the country is going to facilitate regulations for foreign investments.

Addressing a conference of the annual World Investment Report (WIR) by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Hosseini called Iranian government's regulations for attracting foreign investments 'persuasive and facilitating'.
""According to that (regulations), the small-scale (foreign) investors can easily take their capital out of the country and the large-scale investors, which possess 10 percent of the agency's value or 10 percent of the management position, can take their capital out of the country after two years upon receiving permission (from the government),"" Hosseini said without further elaboration.
According to the UNCTAD report, Iran attracted some 3 billion dollars in foreign investments in 2009, an 86 percent increase year on year, while the average foreign investment rate worldwide fell by 38 percent, the minister noted.
He also praised Iranian provincial officials' performance in attracting foreign investments and said that ""the local governors should enhance their negotiations with the foreign countries and they (the local governors) should be given (much) authorities (in their negotiations with foreign investors).""
Deputy economy minister, Behrooz Alishiri, said for his part that ""there is security for the foreign investments in the country and Iran can offer the opportunities (of investments) for the foreigners,"" according to the Mehr News Agency.
""The potentials for the investment in Iran is very unique which have performed as the backfire for the sanctions against the country,"" Alishiri was quoted as saying.
The UN Conference on Trade and Development was established in 1964 as a permanent intergovernmental body. It is the principal organ of the UN General Assembly dealing with trade, investment, and development issues.
The organization's goals are to ""maximize the trade, investment and development opportunities of developing countries and assist them in their efforts to integrate into the world economy on an equitable basis.